Rooney: Criticism Can Be Hard To Handle

“They have got good players, they have got a good squad”.

With Chelsea and Liverpool out of the title race, the expectation is that United should be at a minimum in the top three, and ideally challenging for the league title. “Hopefully we won’t allow that at the weekend”.

“Under Alex Ferguson, we played in a more attacking style of football and played in a 4-4-2”.

He added: “I have tried to lift the confidence of my players”. But there will be times when that happens.

The club is fifth in the table, below fourth-placed Tottenham on goal difference but nine points behind surprise leaders Leicester.

Van Gaal himself has insisted that his job will come under threat if the results do not improve at the earliest.

Manchester United has made no official offer to Jose Mourinho to replace Louis van Gaal at the Premier League club, according to the Portuguese manager’s agent Jorge Mendes.

Bastian Schweinsteiger is suspended, while United are also without Matteo Darmian and Jesse Lingard (both hamstring), although Van Gaal hopes the Italian will be back to face Chelsea on 28 December.

“If there are opportunities and the right players are available we will have conversations with people you need to have conversations with and we will see where that takes us”.

“Do you think that I want to talk with the media now?” the 64-year-old said, glaring at the assembled throng.

“It’s not nice, obviously, getting criticized every week, every game”, he said.

The last few results haven’t been great for us and it’s frustrating, and as a player it’s hard to deal with so we have to be strong together and try and get the better results we need. “We are not in a good position but four weeks ago we were first in the Premier League and in about four weeks we can again be back in that position”.

“So it looks like we are on the right train going the right way”. In a five-minute rant, the Dutchman accused the media of trying to undermine him in his position as United manager. “We all have families and sometimes there’s a lot of stuff that gets written that’s not nice for our families, for your family to see”.

He said: “I can’t remember a United run of form this bad in recent memory and it’s not just that, it’s who they’re losing to”.